The Wizard of Gore

Some say the Wizard of Gore is one of HG Lewis' weaker flicks, but I must disagree. Blood Feast may have been more ground-breaking and unintentionally hilarious, but W.O.G. stands up fine against that movie and any of his other gore films. There is a certain cheesy charm to Lewis movies, no matter if they are skin flicks, gore flicks, or even kiddie flicks. In this movie, the wonderfully hammy Ray Sager plays the Wizard and his main occupation seems to be delivering quasi-fascistic prattle to audiences with mutton chop sideburns, interspersed with running his fingers through the tomato-sauce covered animal organs that erupt from his victims, all to the audience's delight. There is some weak storyline involving an independent woman reporter and her well-tanned boyfriend, who try to solve the mystery of the Wizard, the fools. However, this is pretty much just window dressing for the 5-6 gory scenes of the Wizard doing his thing. In particular, there is an eyeball poking and manipulating scene that would have done Lucio Fulci proud. And please don't forget the awesome furniture and late 60's bourgeois home furnishings and polyester pantsuits that make all of these late 60's films look like "Barbarella" by todays standards. If anything, you have to love the fact that there was actually a time in this country where you could make a movie like this and it would be distributed. Thinking about the time period when Lewis was doing his thing and the way he was doing it is enough to blow your mind even more than his movies. If you haven't checked them out, you are doing yourself a disservice!